2021 International Record Reviews
Here’s 10 reviews I wrote about punk and adjacent record releases from this year.
LEAKING HEAD — Demo 2021 Cassette
This record fucking rules. The REAGEN YOUTH cover rocks especially. It features some very whiny vocals and sick drum fills. I played it so much that Bandcamp did that thing where it says ‘The time has come to open thy heart/wallet.‘ and wouldn’t let me play anything more. The track “Hate Stalks” is probably their most interesting song. Wellington based Razored Raw did a ’80’s Euro Hardcore Demo Lo-Fi’ release for this in NZ which is cool. Listen to it if you like punk music.
V.D.I. — Idem Cassette
A kind of corny punk band from Argentina. The vocals are melodic and fun, and the album art features the hottest thing known to mankind — Nuns smoking cigarettes. I like these kind of releases because I can’t find fucking anything about the band. My favorite track is “Enloqueciendo”. Some of the other tracks aren’t interesting, but they’ve got filler-background-noise-appeal. “Rosalia” is particularly cheesy with 90s skate punk melodic rhythm going on for some reason, it sounds like a god damn fucking BAD RELIGION track.
WRISTWATCH — Wristwatch LP
I’m amazed that records sounding like this are still coming out. I thought garage and synth bohemian shit disappeared a few years ago around the time when FIDLAR and WAVVES and all that fucked off. It’s a boring record. The lunatic guitarist should quit the band and become a barista and work at a bespoke cafe where he belongs. “Fake” has an ‘E’ for ‘Explicit’ next to the track name on Spotify, so I assumed it would have some wild boy lyrics about women with bad behaviour, but it was just more year 9 music room keyboard drum machine noises with goofy guitar riffs. The chorus is ‘I am boring — You’re so boring’, which is like, perfect. It sucks cos like, the only track I kinda enjoyed was the first one, “Screwed”. It’s ‘punchy’ and fun. Not sure why the rest isn’t.
WORLD PEACE — Come And See LP
This record is excellent. It’s extremely clean and coherent for a Powerviolence record. It’s a record named after the Soviet Holocaust movie Come And See and features a song called “Promised Land” with the lyrics ‘the elders of Zion came vowing to provide’ and another song HE WHOSE CUP RUNNETH OVER with the lyrics ‘the elders of Zion will fall’ which is extremely hilarious. They’re from the Bay Area so I’m assuming everyone just thinks they’re Nazis. World Peace released a split tour EP with NZ’s STRESS GHETTO last year called FALL 2019 TOUR SPLIT RELEASE.
ADRENOCHROME — The Knife Single
This is fucking cool. Their logo looks like a crust band’s logo for some reason and it sounds like a deathrock goth song which is terrific. Their ‘about’ section on Facebook reads ‘NO CONSPIRACY THEORY/SCIENCE DENYING HERE! Q freaks move along this page is NOT for you!’ because of their stellar namesake, which I think is tres uncool and Not a fun way to approach such a badass chemical so fuck them.
HWANZA — DEMO EP
An extremely sick outfit from Seoul. Lots of shouting over melodic guitar and bass. “F.Y.C.T.” is cool and “인간공장” has some guitar riffs with WASTED YOUTH like inflection. I like these type of monotonous vocals paired up with those types of riffs, it’s just the right type of Hardcore. They got a cool band insignia/icon too. There was some American ESL teacher in the band which is very funny.
ISMATIC GURU — Ismatic Guru Cassette
The record art betrays the fact that this is a pretty ‘lackluster’ release. I don’t know, I’m listening to it a bunch and it’s just pretty uninteresting. Sounds like fucking Electroswing almost. Definite polka dot polyamarous Rockabilly couple adjacent music. It sounds like they’re trying to be Q AND NOT U but its just coming out like fucking CAGE THE ELEPHANT or something. “Imposter” is the only good song.
BOOTLICKER — Bootlicker LP
This record is ridiculous. It comes in hard and rocks. Lots of weird distortedly recorded chugs which sound extremely good in this context. It’s UK82 sounding shit that doesn’t sound at all dorky in this different context. All in all a great record. Just some real bullshit Vancouver urbanite music. A lot of BDSM imagery comes to mind, though IDK if that’s got much to do with anyone who still takes lace code seriously if not hanky code
OPTIC NERVE — In A Fast Car Waving Goodbye Cassette
Looks and sounds like Australian punk for Sydney ‘intellectuals’. The description compares the guitarist to D Boon which I think is a huge stretch unless you think all twangy bluegrass guitar tones sound like the Minutemen, and I don’t think that’s what they’re even going for. It’s neat how the vocalist sounds like he’s running out of breath in “Quickscope”. Not a bad record by any means.
MARAUDEUR — Puissance 4 LP
This band sounds like a weird Western-European type of GUERILLA TOSS but less melodic and I guess play more akin to Noise Rock. It’s definitely some strange art girl or queer non-binary nosering music that uses drum machines the correct way. “Slow Track” is my favorite song from the record, maybe because heavy-accented English singing is charming paired with delayed snap percussion. Respect for the album art containing a couple cheeky throwies despite not being a Hardcore band.
